Kristopher Chavezhttp://kristopherchavez.com
Kristopher Chavez, Entrepreneur and Investor at CI, IncThu, 15 Feb 2018 16:26:45 +0000en-UShourly1https://wordpress.org/?v=4.8App Review: Libby the Library Apphttp://kristopherchavez.com/app-review-libby-the-library-app/
http://kristopherchavez.com/app-review-libby-the-library-app/#respondThu, 15 Feb 2018 16:26:16 +0000http://kristopherchavez.com/?p=200 Read More Read More]]>It’s rare for me to pick up a physical book these days. Most of my reading is done on my iPhone though my Kindle app or through iBooks. It has been years and years since I have stepped foot in a library – until this past week when I couldn’t wait to start a book that was no longer in print. It never even occurred to me to check the library. But sure enough, there it was. Even more surprising was the realization that many libraries are charging into the digital world without me even knowing.

Did you know you can now rent thousands of eBooks and audiobooks for free from your library just like you would rent a physical book? You don’t even need to go into the library to do this. Download the Libby app through the app store or google play. You just enter in your library card number and you can immediately access full ebooks to read on your device even if you are thousands of miles from your library.

Keep in mind that not every book is available, and you may have to wait until someone else is done ‘borrowing’ the book you want, but if you have some flexibility it is a great way to enjoy the convenience of renting a book without having to pay for an ebook. If you are like me and you prefer reading digitally but you would rather not have to buy every book you read – check this app out. Even if you download one book for free to enjoy it will be well worth the two minutes it took you to read this short post and download the app.

Maybe I’ve been under a rock and everyone is already doing this – but I thought this e-library concept was worth saying a few words about. I’m glad to have discovered it.

]]>http://kristopherchavez.com/app-review-libby-the-library-app/feed/0Quora: How to deal with false accusations and negative criticism?http://kristopherchavez.com/quora-how-to-deal-with-false-accusations-and-negative-criticism/
http://kristopherchavez.com/quora-how-to-deal-with-false-accusations-and-negative-criticism/#respondMon, 05 Feb 2018 21:04:53 +0000http://kristopherchavez.com/?p=187 Read More Read More]]>I was recently asked this question on Quora. Click here for the original Quora post. Below I have added a bit more commentary:

Initially after I was falsely accused, I thought that it had to be a mistake and investigators would discover the error of their ways and everything would be put back together quickly. This has yet to happen.

I could have never imagined the amount of destruction one false accusation could cause. When the false narrative in the newspaper was widely disseminated by email and mail to my customers it was devastating to my business and my personal reputation. It didn’t matter that the article was misleading and inaccurate – it only mattered that there was a mug shot of a formally respected member of the community and a juicy narrative in the local paper. It was (and still is) painful to think of my close friends, family, and associates reading the misinformation.

I believe that people are generally good, and that my errant prosecution is one of the anomalies in an otherwise well functioning justice system. My affiliated companies did a great job for many thousands of clients for over a decade prior to the case being brought. No company does a perfect job, but good companies strive to continuously improve their offering – especially when faced with adversity. We worked through many challenges and continued to provide services to existing clients even after the case was brought and access to our client files was blocked. A company with different intentions would just simply have closed down. I vowed that we would not stop until each and every client received the assistance they paid for. In fact, to this day our clients can still call the toll-free number that has been active for over a decade and receive assistance for any questions they may have. This phone rarely rings now that we are no longer accepting new business, but I have no plans to discontinue its use as a matter of principle.

Detectives and prosecutors are overworked, and do not have the time to carefully review every case prior to trial. Soon, someone will take the time to review the facts of the case as trial approaches. I look forward to that day, and I will be grateful to the people who take the time. In taking the time to review, they will find happy former employees, happy past and current clients, and happy vendors. Every business that does millions of dollars in revenue annually will have a small percentage of dissatisfied clients in the minority of otherwise deeply satisfied clients. I am proud of the vision and the business we built. We offered a valuable service to a community desperately in need of help – timeshare owners of every age and socioeconomic status.

My wife Kathryn is a stay at home mom. She works her butt off every single day. I always knew she worked hard, but to be honest, I didn’t realize the amount of patience required to do what she does day in and day out. Kathryn sometimes leaves me with our daughter Penelope when she needs to run errands or go to the gym. When she does, try as I might, I cannot get a thing done on my to do list. Yesterday, an obvious thought occurred to me “If I am unable to get tasks on my list done, how on earth does Kathryn get tasks on her list done?” It turns out, she doesn’t. Kathryn has a list of personal priorities that she just doesn’t get to, ever. I work a lot, and don’t get as much time with Penelope as I would like.

THE SOLUTION: A DADDY ADVENTURE

Kathryn needed some time. When I came home from the gym yesterday morning Kathryn was hard at work making one of her famous nutritious lunch bowls for us to eat. I tapped her on the shoulder and told her that I talked to a “pirate” at the gym who told me where to find a secret treasure. She looked at me like a lunatic, and I told her that Penelope and I would be hunting for it all afternoon. Kathryn would get some freedom. I have never seen her so excited. She threw her arms around me and said “thank you, are you serious?” Clearly I should have done something like this much sooner.

Kathryn helped me gather some old costume jewelry she had and a watch box that would become the “treasure chest.” Kathryn also gave me a crown depicting Penelope’s favorite Disney Princess — Elsa to add to the pirate loot. After assembling the package I broke the exciting news to Penelope. She has a thing for pirates lately and thought my gym encounter was the coolest thing she had heard. She made a dead sprint to her bedroom to get her swimming suit and bucket to hold the treasure.

Penelope Chavez digging for buried treasure.

When Penelope and I got to the beach it was deserted (it was a Monday afternoon). I buried the treasure when Penelope was away looking in a different spot. After the treasure was buried, we went to work searching for it. Penelope dug and dug in the sand until she finally found it!

Oh, the glorious spoils of her search!

Having a closer look at the treasure

Needless to say, it was an amazing day for Penelope and an equally amazing day for Kathryn. When I was putting Penelope in the car to head back home after the adventure I thought to myself that today had been one of the best days of my life. That sounds like a big statement, and it is. I have had thousands of days in my life that I would have considered were “better” than yesterday, but this was different. Our day was was so simple, and so pure, and so wonderful. Seeing the joy in my wife and daughter’s eyes gave me a feeling of peace and happiness. We have been under a lot of stress this year and I want nothing more than to recreate the positive feelings of yesterday again for my family. I have committed to creating little adventures with Penelope on a weekly basis to give Kathryn time to focus on her greater purpose, and to fully invest myself in my beautiful daughter who brings so much joy to my life.

Having a closer look at the treasure
]]>http://kristopherchavez.com/buried-treasure-found-on-the-treasure-coast%e2%80%8a-%e2%80%8adaddy-adventures/feed/0Justice delayed: Kristopher Chavez’s 6th amendment right to a speedy trial violatedhttp://kristopherchavez.com/justice-delayed-kristopher-chavezs-6th-amendment-right-to-a-speedy-trial-violated/
http://kristopherchavez.com/justice-delayed-kristopher-chavezs-6th-amendment-right-to-a-speedy-trial-violated/#commentsSat, 03 Feb 2018 15:50:12 +0000http://kristopherchavez.com/?p=168 Read More Read More]]>Yesterday, February 2, 2018 my attorneys informed me that my trial originally scheduled for March 5, 2018 would be delayed until July 16, 2018. A hearing was held and the judge decided at the urging of the prosecutor and a co-defendant to delay the case (against our objections). This post is to create a public date-stamp to document that I believe my constitutional right to a speedy trial has been violated and as an innocent man, a great continuing harm will result to my business, customers, employees, reputation, and family.

I pray that justice will be done soon in this case, so we may begin picking up the pieces of our shattered lives caused by this mistaken prosecution. Thank you to everyone who continue to love and support us through this ordeal.

I, like most people had no idea what it meant to be indicted by a Grand Jury. I just knew it sounded terrible and that only really bad people that have done terrible, awful reprehensible things were indicted. Moreover, I thought the words “indicted” and “guilty” were synonymous with one another. I thought that if a person was indicted by a Grand Jury then they were indeed guilty and found guilty not by a regular jury, but a grand one! They must have done some really bad stuff, right?

That was of course before it happened to me.

On December 6, 2016 I was informed by my attorney that I had a warrant for my arrest. I said to them “are you kidding me?” I was standing in an office space we were building out with an architect and had to excuse myself. It was the most shocking moment of my life. I just kept asking my attorney “for what” and he kept answering “I don’t know, they won’t tell us.” This didn’t make any sense to me. How can I have a warrant for my arrest and not know why? He informed me that I would need to travel from the East Coast to Boulder Colorado to turn myself in. I couldn’t understand how I could be expected to turn myself in without being given a reason why. This is America, isn’t it? Shouldn’t I know what I am begin accused of and by whom?

My attorneys planned for me to go to Boulder to turn myself in on December 14th and I did exactly that. The next day after posting a $100,000 bond and before I could blink it was in the paper – the prosecution’s version of a story that was filled with inaccuracies, misstatements and horrifying false accusations. I was reading the paper and finding out the prosecution’s version of their story at the same time as everyone else in Boulder and the surrounding community. That’s when my wife’s and my phone started to ring. We will never forget the wonderful support of our friends, neighbors, community members and family during that terrible time. We love you!

So how does this sort of thing happen? How could all of this occur without the subject of the indictment (me) know what was happening?

The Grand Jury Process:

There is an age-old adage that a prosecutor could get a Grand Jury to “indict a ham sandwich” if that was the prosecutor’s goal. In fact, according to a U.S. Department of Justice study on plea bargaining, “Grand juries are notorious for being ‘rubberstamps’ for the prosecutor for virtually all routine criminal matters.”

Grand juries do not need a unanimous decision to indict. It simply needs either two thirds or three fourths agreement for an indictment. The jurors are also not deciding on “gult or innocence” they are deciding on whether the one-sided case presented to them by the prosecutor established the low barrier of “probable cause” that a crime was committed.

Grand juries originated in 12th century England to prosecute criminals; in the early 20th century, England abolished them. All of the other members of the former British Empire – Scotland, Wales, New Zealand, Ireland, Australia, and Canada have done the same – but not the United States. Even here in the U.S. most states have stopped using them because those who truly seek justice have found that the secrecy, lack of oversight, and disregard for the rules of evidence do not serve justice. Boulder Colorado not only still uses grand juries, but the District Attorney advocates for them.

I am filled with gratitude to have the support of my friends, family and community members during this lengthy process. This has been a terrible experience but each time I see my family and glance in the mirror I’m filled with the calm assurance that a regular jury at trial that has the benefit of all the information, not just one-sided crafted testimony will set the record straight and my name will be vindicated. I hope that my fellow good community members that made up the grand jury that indicted me on incomplete, inaccurate and crafted testimony fed to them by the prosecutor will watch the trial closely so they can see how different the version they were presented with is from the truth. When that happens, I encourage them to not remain silent about their experience. Thank you for reading.

]]>http://kristopherchavez.com/boulder-colorado-grand-jury-indictment-ham-sandwiches-beware/feed/0StubHub Saved me Over $1khttp://kristopherchavez.com/stubhub-saved-me-over-1k/
http://kristopherchavez.com/stubhub-saved-me-over-1k/#respondWed, 17 Jul 2013 16:24:13 +0000http://kristopherchavez.com/?p=143 Read More Read More]]>Last week due to my own disorganization I purchased 8 nonrefundable tickets to the wrong concert in the wrong state on the wrong date from TicketMaster. Normally, this would have been a costly mistake as I am not the type of person to spend time posting ads on craigslist and ebay to facilitate a financial transaction with strangers, but I had the good fortune to stumble upon StubHub.com.

It was when I was searching for the correct tickets to purchase I came across this site. Call me naïve but I never realized the huge aftermarket for event tickets. My former impression was that the robust gentlemen standing on the sides of the street with signs reading “I Need Tickets” adequately served the market (see included image). Clearly this isn’t so as StubHub has aftermarket event tickets for every possible event at a range of prices.

Long story short – I spent less than 4 minutes posting my tickets for sale on Friday of last week and as of yesterday they had all been sold at my list price. Granted, I did price them lower range of their posted “average range of sales” for the event, but losing $300 is better than losing $1400 on my silly mistake. I certainly could have posted them at a higher price but this was an experiment. The site even provides a printable UPS label for convenience to send the physical tickets so this took me almost zero time.

The $300 was well worth the introduction to this well run company. Despite the fact that I don’t foresee a need to sell many tickets on this site in the future, I will always shop here when pricing tickets for a future event.

We just returned home from Jamaica early yesterday morning. While this wasn’t our first trip to the beautiful island country it was especially hard this trip to ignore the drastic delta between the haves and the have-nots outside of the gates of our resort. On previous trips we have gone into the local market where local Jamaicans hustle to eke out a living selling fruit, hand made jewelry and the like. While this is a bit of a novelty for us Americans to witness, it was evident that it is a daily struggle for many of these Jamaicans to earn enough to provide necessities beyond food and basic shelter for themselves and their family.

Before leaving our resort while I was standing in the lobby waiting for our bags to be loaded in the transport I saw a picture on the wall of Sir Richard Branson. I have always had a great deal of respect and admiration for his entrepreneurial vision and his willingness to champion causes he cares about. Thanks to WiFi on our flight I was able to read about a charitable campaign he is helping to promote called the Ten Island Renewable Challenge whereby he is helping to bring attention to the local economic benefits created by bringing sustainable energy sources such as wind and solar to island communities.

]]>http://kristopherchavez.com/support-the-ten-island-renewable-challenge/feed/0Pressery Juice Cleanse Resultshttp://kristopherchavez.com/pressery-juice-cleanse-results/
http://kristopherchavez.com/pressery-juice-cleanse-results/#respondFri, 14 Jun 2013 23:43:34 +0000http://kristopherchavez.com/?p=125 Read More Read More]]>A couple of weeks ago a friend of ours introduced us to a new local product he has helped to create and bring to market called Pressery. The Boulder company produces juices that are raw, cold-pressed and fresh from locally sourced fruits and veggies – and of course they are all organic. Due to the hand crafted process these juices are not cheap (~$9 each), but they are a value considering the results from my two day cleanse.

I don’t have the patience to post the exact juices taken each day but I will tell you that I drank 5 juices each day according to the cleanse schedule that came with the package. The schedule is manageable and I was really surprised that at no time during the 2 day cleanse was I even a little bit hungry (truly, not even a little), despite having only these 5 juices and water for a full 48 hours.

THE RESULTS:

After my two day cleanse I stepped on my Aria scale and was floored that I had lost 6.4 pounds in 48 hours! This was nearly 2 weeks ago that I finished the cleanse and the weight has stayed off with less than 30 minutes of daily exercise.

CONCLUSION:

For those of you interested in losing a few pounds quickly I would highly recommend this 2 day cleanse. In fact, I am going to be doing another 2 day cleanse next week before we head to Jamaica to try to lose a couple more leisure pounds for good measure.

Also, don’t let the cost dissuade you. Just compare the nonorganic weight loss supplements that millions of people cram down their throats every day with less results at a higher cost. The value is in the results and this is the best juice I have ever had – period.

]]>http://kristopherchavez.com/pressery-juice-cleanse-results/feed/0Fear or Action – Response to Boston Marathon 2013http://kristopherchavez.com/fear-or-action-response-to-boston-marathon-2013/
http://kristopherchavez.com/fear-or-action-response-to-boston-marathon-2013/#respondTue, 16 Apr 2013 15:21:59 +0000http://kristopherchavez.com/?p=116 Read More Read More]]>I woke up at 3:30 AM this morning with an irrational anxiety tied to the Boston Marathon bombings yesterday. I couldn’t fall back asleep thinking about why someone would take innocent lives and forever change the future of countless others (amputees, family members etc).

While I was struggling with how to understand what had occurred yesterday I came across across a blog post from Brad Feld in my Twitter feed. Brad an avid marathon runner who lived in Boston for a period of time and has strong connections there. Though overcome with emotion, he committed to running the Boston Marathon in 2014.

When I read that, my anxiety evaporated and a sense of duty and purpose took its place. This was the correct response to this terrible attack. I realized at that moment that my initial anxiety was the result desired by the cowards responsible for the horror yesterday. The cowards want to paralyze Americans with fear. I made the decision at that moment to get up and demonstrate my commitment to not live in fear. This is the one decision within my control that can undermine the terrorist motive.

Here is my commitment: I am running my first Marathon in 2014.

We as Americans and as human beings have a choice to direct our actions or allow fear to determine the course of our lives. I have never ran a marathon, or even a half marathon but I am making this public commitment to do so next year to symbolize my commitment to myself, my wife and our future family that I will never allow the course of our lives to be directed by fear.

We can’t predict when or where random acts of violence will occur (a movie theater in Aurora, a school in Littleton or a friendly race in Bean Town) but we can choose to frame the impact they have on us and fight to ensure we do not forfeit our freedom and our happiness to the perpetrators.

I ask you to choose action over fear, and let’s do this together. If you are interested in running a marathon in 2014 or even a 5k in the next year – let’s do it. Let’s get our calendars out and make it happen (we may even burn a few calories and make some new friends in the process). Comment, Email kristopher@kristopher.com or Tweet if you are interested.

I recognize now that over time I have conditioned myself to be in pure reactive mode much of the day. Not unlike Pavlov’s dog, when I get a notification regardless of what I am doing, I have been immediately refocusing at least a portion of my capacity on either tending to the stimuli or at least recognizing it as an extra line item on my todo list. I have come to realize that this is not healthy, nor is this reactive relationship with my notifications in line with the personal and professional goals I have for this year and beyond.

The past week I took the small step of turning off my desktop email notifications. With an average of 50-65 substantive emails each day, this has been a real challenge. I still think that I check my email too frequently but I am committing to batch the emails into 4 email response sessions daily beginning Monday (eventually I would like to get this down to 2). I haven’t tackled my other notifications yet as I want to get a handle on the largest culprit first.

We all know the efficiency benefits of “batching” our daily tasks, but the concept is much harder to create a habit around when we are conditioned to be reactive. Our devices can be an amazing tool for efficiency, but if these devices begin dictating our actions in a reactive way it turns from help to hinderance. This is the first step I am taking to free myself from this unhealthy reactive relationship and if you know me, you know it is going to be a challenge. I’m ready for it. Wish me luck!